Shinan: Westons fete the twin vision of Gert and Uwe Tobias

From Transylvania to … well … the bosom of the Westons! Buckingham Palace extendee Princess Michael of Kent and crystal clan member Danna Swarovski were just some of the grandees out at a pre-pre-holiday bash thrown by Hilary and Galen Weston at the Whitechapel Gallery, tucked inside their Floridian home-away-from-home, Windsor. Their fete-fate? To shower yet more art-world sparkle on those identical Romanian twins, Gert and Uwe Tobias.

Art-world heavies such as MOMA conductor Glenn Lowry and that E.M. Forster-ish auctioneer Simon de Pury turned up at the behest of their billionaire Canadian hosts. As did some faces from back home — Toronto enthusiasts such as Cheryl McEwan, Lynda Prince and Charles Baillie, among them. And the talk, I understand, was very twins-saturated.

“I know twins who … ” “My sister had twins, and they …” “The thing about twins is …” And, well, you get the drift.

Gert and Uwe Tobias — both dark, handsome and the source of fascination in the curatorial galaxy — were, indeed, born in Transylvania, and their work, as described by the Guardian, “has evolved from the kind of private language twins occasionally develop, from mutual shared obsessions, with its repetitive motifs … full of funny heads and scary faces, weird beings with pendulous noses, creepy expressions, and peculiar extruded bodies.”

Positively folkloric, I take it!

The twins’ latest exhibition, by the way, is the second of three shows curated by the Whitechapel Gallery in partnership with our Mrs. Weston.

OK, meanwhile: Some laser eye surgery with your pepper-crusted carpaccio? The worlds, they do collide.

The near- and far-sighted have long lived in peace with La Société, the Toronto hot spot that’s found in the very same building, a.k.a. The Colonnade, as the world-renowned Herzig Eye Institute. But on one cool recent night, everyone got an even bigger eyeful when the institute’s co-founders, Dr. Sheldon Herzig and Cherry Tabb, hosted a party at the bistro. Part holiday merry-merry, part relaunch of an expanded space devoted to LASIK, refractive surgery, etc. And among those spotted mixing it up? The kind of Bloor Street tableau that included Trevor Born, Anne Mroczkowski, Nancy Pencer, Andrea Wiseman-Daniel … and, well, Charles Khabouth, the man from La Société, just downstairs.

The special-est guest, perhaps? That would be Canadian para-athlete and an officer in the Royal Canadian Air Force, Kimberly Fawcett. She’s one of the first patients at the Herzig Eye Institute to undergo an innovative new procedure called KAMRA Vision for the treatment of presbyopia, i.e. the loss of reading vision that hits almost everyone after the age of 40.

Fawcett was only too happy to share her story with partygoers. While others, well, had only tunnel vision for some of the culinary delights that were brought up from the boldface brasserie downstairs: towers of shrimp, oyster, and crabs were spotted, as was foie grass, cheese balls, those inevitable beef sliders and frites. Lots and lots of frites.

This! That!

• Jazzy chanteuse Molly Johnson was serving up her traditional bowl of black eyed peas — plus cornbread! — at her family’s legendary New Year’s Levee, held every year in the Annex.

• One can never have enough Christmas protein! Former governor-general Adrienne Clarkson and her renaissance husband John Ralston Saul were spotted right before the holidays bulking up with some major meat at Rowe Farms.

• Eugene Levy! Eye-spied Patachou’ing in Rosedale.

• Bay Street scion Duncan Jackman rented out all of Gusto 101, on Portland, for his holiday party hijinks.

• One of the Canada’s most famous artists, the moose-inclined Charles Pachter, turned the big 7-0 the other day, and he did so with some Chinese-Peruvian! A birthday dinner was held at the new culture-bending eatery La Casita.

• $825,000 raised! At the Spark Gala — in aide of the Ronald McDonald House! A pretty good way to end the 2012 gala season, this glam-o gala, set at the Carlu, and commandeered by an A-team that included the Post’s Amoryn Engel, Krystal Koo, Sarah Richardson and Eleanor McCain.

• Standard-setter Jeanne Beker seeing the year out with passion, torment, love, pain and mysticism! Found, last weekend, getting a closer look at the Frida & Diego exhibition, on at the AGO.

Travel Videos

There’s a big world out there, but it’s hard to see it when you’re sitting behind a desk, which is why writer Maryam Siddiqi took more than two weeks holiday. Actually, she took almost seven months to travel to 20 countries on four continents, documenting the journey the whole way. Visit our interactive map to see where Maryam went.